Biography
T'ang Haywen: A Butterfly in the World of Art
T'ang Haywen (1927-1991) occupies a unique place in the history of modern Chinese art. Unlike many of his contemporaries, T'ang was largely self-taught, forging his own path between Eastern tradition and Western innovation. This is the story of an artist who sought liberation through his work, finding profound expression in the simple act of painting for himself.
Zeng Tianfu (曾天福), the artist later known as T'ang Haywen (曾海文), was born on 20 December 1927, in Xiamen (formerly Amoy), Fujian province, China. At the age of ten, he and his family relocated to Vietnam, settling in Cholon, the Chinese quarter of Saigon (now Ho Chi Minh City).
T'ang Haywen stands apart as a member of the second generation of Chinese artists who emigrated to France after World War II. Unlike his contemporaries Chu Teh-Chun and Zao Wou-Ki, who benefited from formal training at the Hangzhou Academy, T'ang was self-taught. His artistic and intellectual development was instead shaped by his grandfather's teachings in calligraphy and the principles of Taoism.
T'ang Haywen (right) with his parents and younger brother in Taizhong Park, 1932. The photograph was taken on the first day of the first month of the seventh year of the Showa period.
T'ang Haywen's handwritten letter to his parents, dated 8 February 1958, in which he expresses his ambition to dedicate his life to art.
In 1948, T'ang departed for France, ostensibly to study medicine but, in reality, to escape familial expectations. He soon abandoned his parents' prescribed path, choosing instead to attend art courses at the Académie de la Grande Chaumière. He spent his time immersed in the works of Western masters like Gauguin, Cézanne, and Matisse, absorbing their techniques and visions. Even in these early works, a distinct Chinese spirit was evident. T'ang explored a diverse range of subjects: Parisian landscapes, interiors, portraits, self-portraits, and still lifes.
His fascination with Shitao, the iconoclastic 17th-century painter, and a deep-seated wanderlust set him on a path quite different from that of his fellow Chinese artists in Paris. In 1958, he confided in a letter to his brother: "I have found my vocation in painting... I don't believe this will please our parents... this is a very grave matter. Honestly, there can be no question of seeking success for its own sake. Success, to be truly success, must be completely sincere. Once a painter finds himself, then he can work for others, he must do it, but not before... I cannot, nor do I want to, abandon this vocation."
The early 1960s marked a turning point, with T'ang increasingly favoring gouache, watercolors, and ink on paper. He masterfully blended traditional Chinese elements of abstract washes with the more lyrical and luminous styles of Western art.
He developed a unique pictorial space, often working on standard-sized cardboard sheets. Initially, he used formats of 29.7x21cm and 70x50cm. He then innovatively combined two 29.7x21cm sheets to create a diptych of 29.7x42cm. Ultimately, he refined his approach, creating the large 70x100cm diptych that became a defining characteristic of his work. His signature evolved over time: first, simply "TANG" in capital letters, then "TANG" with an apostrophe, and finally, his most frequent signature, a combination of Roman letters and Chinese characters: T'ang 海文 (where "海文" represents his given name, Hay-wen).
In 1964, he painted "Homage to Cézanne" on a 70x50cm sheet, reinterpreting the composition of "The Large Bathers." This work exemplified his engagement with a lineage of artistic inspiration, tracing a line from Rubens to Cézanne, or Titian to Manet, echoing the Impressionists' quest for renewal.
A comparison of T'ang Haywen's "Homage to Cézanne" (right) with its inspiration, Cézanne's "The Large Bathers" (left).
Homage to Gauguin - Where do we come from?, 1968, gouache & ink on Kyro card, 70x100cm
From 1960 to 1965, T'ang produced a series of small oil paintings, often on newsprint. These works, born of material constraints, signaled a significant shift in his artistic direction. The use of oil, a Western medium, coupled with the diminutive scale, hinted at a profound and intimate ambition, reminiscent of Paul Klee, as well as individualists like Shitao and Bada Shanren.
In 1968, he created a large diptych depicting three nude women with black hair and dark skin. Inspired by Gauguin's exotic ideals, the work directly quotes his masterpiece "D'où venons-nous? Que sommes-nous? Où allons nous (Where are we from? What are we? Where are we going?)." T'ang inscribed the title "D'où venons nous? (Where are we from?)" on the back of the piece.
The early 1970s saw T'ang traveling to India at the invitation of the Maharani of Porbandar, accompanied by his friend, the painter Andre Dzierzynski. He then moved to Goa. On the beaches of Goa, he met filmmaker Tom Tam (Thomas Tam) and his companion Martha Sandler. T'ang and Dzierzynski appeared with Martha in the short experimental film "Furen Boogie". Later, in 1973, T'ang and Tam collaborated on what is considered to be the first film d'artiste by a contemporary Chinese painter: "T'ang Boogie", filmed in T'ang's small apartment on the rue Liancourt in Paris.
Throughout the 1970s and 1980s, T'ang's life was marked by travel and exhibitions. In 1975, curator Mary Trégéar showcased his ink works at the Ashmolean Museum in Oxford. T'ang exhibited regularly at the Nane Stern gallery in Paris, as well as in galleries in Switzerland, Italy, and Germany. A friend introduced him to Dominique de Menil in the United States, and he sold her a large diptych. However, he did not pursue further relationships with major collectors, seemingly indifferent to the trappings of success. As Father Jean Irigoyen observed in 1994: "It must be recognized that his detachment from the material had as a corollary a precariousness, which naturally drove him to intensely live in the present instant, with the appetite of one who has everything, but possesses nothing."
Excerpt of Furen Boogie by Tom Tam in 1974 © Thomas Tam
T'ang Haywen and "Peter Pan" (Above), T'ang Haywen (Below)
T'ang Haywen painted with Chinese calligraphy brush in his studio-apartment in Paris.
T'ang's life was defined by chance encounters. He prioritized personal fulfillment over professional advancement. In 1988, he was invited to exhibit in the CHINA-PARIS exhibition at the Taipei Fine Arts Museum. The curator of the exhibition wrote in the preface: "Zao Wou-Ki, Chu Teh-Chun, and T'ang Haywen have associated calligraphy and Chinese philosophy in a non-representational art and are distinguished as abstract expressionist painters."
Chinese painting and calligraphy share the same fundamental nature and techniques: the round brush, ink and water, on paper or silk. Both create their own pictorial space. While some consider this space inherently abstract, Zao, Chu, and T'ang never identified themselves as abstract painters. T'ang wrote in 1972: "...Certainly, the play of abstraction can briefly stimulate the spirit, but once the instant of decryption and comprehension is passed, there is no further flourishing of sensibility, the number is dead, the memory itself is wiped clean. Our profound sensibility, related to the unconscious, can only develop and grow when nourished by the tangible, that is to say, in relation to a painting, by the recollection in our conscious memory of experiences that are sensitive, profound and durable and lived in the real world. From a specific material more or less preponderant representation painting can develop and renew without losing itself, and expand into the domains of emotion and spirituality..."
In the early 1980s, T'ang continued to create diptychs in various formats, as well as small triptychs in ink and color and numerous small watercolors that his friends used as greeting cards. He embraced a simpler lifestyle, and his spiritual quest led him to a close-knit group of friends, including the gallery owner Nane Stern. Together, they traveled to Fontgombault Abbey for Easter celebrations. In 1984, T'ang was baptized there, taking the Christian name François. (The name François, of Latin or Germanic origin, means "free man.")
In 1983 and 1984, thanks to his friend Dominique Ponnau, T'ang exhibited in Brittany (France) at the Musée des Beaux Arts de Quimper and then at the Musée du Château de Vitré. His large diptychs were still painted on cardboard produced from wood fibers. Some friends encouraged him to choose a support more suited for artworks. T'ang began to paint on Arches paper, produced from cotton fibers renowned for their durability.
Untitled, 1980s, ink on Arches paper, overall 70x100cm, diptych
T'ang continued to travel and exhibit in France and abroad. His last major trip took him to Georgia, but his health deteriorated rapidly. In June 1991, after dining at the home of the Audy-Waldé family, he fell ill. Janine Waldé, a medical doctor, took him to the hospital emergency room, and he was hospitalized in July. A few days later, he learned that he had contracted AIDS. He left the hospital briefly, accompanied by Caroline Waldé, to collect his mail and make plans, but died of respiratory complications on 9 September 1991.
Towards the end of the 1990s, T'ang's work began to attract wider attention. Several significant exhibitions, notably those at the Oceanographic Museum of Monaco, the Taipei Fine Arts Museum, the Guimet Museum, and the Shiseido Foundation, highlighted the importance and originality of his artistic vision.
From a contemporary perspective, it may seem paradoxical that an artist who, in a sense, invented a pictorial space did not do everything possible to promote it. For T'ang, however, this was simply another form of liberation: to find his space and explore it in every possible way. He identified with Cézanne's declared goal "to capture this instant in nature as seen in the eye of the painter," and, as a Taoist, he made the conscious decision to paint for himself.
His oeuvre is a narrative, a perspective on adventures that did not suffer from the constraints of renown as much as he believed in a success that he alone could find. All these moments accumulated in the music of "mountains and waters", captured in a moment of solitary joy and then written in the sky over the paper; few people have seen them. Yet the body of work is there – complete, almost unknown, almost pristine and, as rarely occurs in the history of art, coherent with the confluences of the artist's life and work. His work remains a discovery for many, and the unfolding of his story is yet another paradox.
How often does an artist's oeuvre become the target of counterfeiters and the subject of multiple misunderstandings even before it is widely known and recognized? Could there be this point in common between art lovers and art predators – even though the very idea is disagreeable – of being able to recognize the importance and possibilities in the work of T'ang.
In the history of Chinese modernity, Chu Teh-Chun was the warrior tasked with revitalizing the spirit of the Song dynasty; Zao Wou-Ki was the mandarin, confident in his genius and expanding the boundaries of history. T'ang Haywen was simply a butterfly, flitting from flower to flower.